It operates to arouse hatred against hatred, to induce a gut reaction against gut reactions, and by so doing serves to sustain a morbid emotionalism of the very sort it claims to abominate. - The NationEDIT

The picture is a kind of pop masterpiece, bursting with vigor, ingenious as the devil, handsome, efficient, engrossing-and quite deliberately divorced from any reality outside a dark theatre. - The NationEDIT

It abounds in heroics, glories in coincidence, indulges in sentiment, laughs at Cupid's bizarre sense of humor and provides sumptuous parts for the five leading players, who know how to seize their opportunities. - The NationEDIT

Spielberg's intent may be satirical, but I find these stereotypes even more depressing than hobgoblins, and would not have minded if they'd all been dragged off into the fourth dimension. - The NationEDIT

Harlan County attains its main goal-to honor a segment of our society which the rest of America has been willing to write off as underdogs, victims sacrificed to the imperatives of an industrial nation. - The NationEDIT

Travis Bickle's trouble was that he couldn't get close to anyone, but Robert De Niro's trouble is that he can't get past the audio-visual pandemonium to show you Bickle's torment from inside. - The NationEDIT

As a piece of film making, The Illegals suffers from the monotony and repetition of literal truth. As pamphleteering, the picture fails even more because it seems to be watching for our tears. - The New RepublicEDIT

As a cops-and-robbers extravagance, it would be a good, if stubbornly routine, job. Its special distinction is that it pauses every few minutes for an illustrated lecture on the internal operations of the FBI. - The New RepublicEDIT

A reviewer must exercise some tact in discussing this picture. It is a work of such high and subtle art that the temptation is to run in with a smother of adjectives and a display of analytical explanation. - The NationEDIT

One is forced to spend much more time in examining these women than in getting to understand them. They are treated as objects not subjects -- an attitude which, whether intentionally or not, is relevant to contemporary corruption. - The NationEDIT

I enjoyed the picture because it is an action romance, worked out in wonderfully inventive detail and presented with mesmeric immediacy by one of the screen's most resourceful directors. - The NationEDIT

There is plenty wrong with television, plenty to satirize. But Network prudently misses the point, dishing up an outrageous razzle-dazzle stew that will ruffle no network feathers and delight a popular audience. - The NationEDIT